broadband

I think we can all agree that a 4Mbps download is not ‘broadband’ Internet, at least as most would define it. That’s how the FCC currently sees broadband, but FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler agrees with us, and wants to reclassify what broadband actually is. He feels (probably correctly) that ‘broadband’ is more like 25Mbps down. As for upload, he’d like the current definition of 1Mbps to be upped to 3Mbps. In a report, the FCC is also troubled by broadband rollout, especially in rural areas.

For the first time in the United States, the largest service providers saw more Internet subscribers than cable TV subscribers. The information comes from the Leichtman Research Group, which says that by the end of this year's second quarter, there were 49,915,000 total broadband subscribers versus 49,910,000 cable TV subscribers.

Broadview Networks recently did an Internet connectivity speed study and ranked average connection speed all over the United States. With average of 13.7 megabits per second, Virginia took the crown for the fastest Internet in the US. Delaware and Massachusetts come close at 13.1 Mbps.

In our connected world, a solid WiFi connection is important. In your household, there may be several people using the same connection at once, straining your connectivity. While you may technically have broadband Internet, the FCC is deciding whether or not to redefine broadband altogether.

As humankind works towards expanding its presence in space, one day establishing colonies on other planets, questions of communication with Earth become increasingly important. To address this, researchers from MIT and NASA have demonstrated for the first time the ability to beam wireless broadband to space.

New research by the Leichtman Research Group reveals the number of pay-TV subscribers decreased last year across all the major cable companies, among them being Comcast and Time Warner Cable, which are set to merge. Despite this, broadband Internet subscriptions grew over the course of 2013, perhaps hinting at the shift towards so-called cable cutting.

In November of 2013, the FCC launched an app for Android users with the intention of crowd sourcing details about the speed of broadband networks around the country. The application was called simply enough the FCC Speed Test App and is now available for iOS users to download.

To the consumer, having a municipal broadband network in your city probably sounds like a great thing. It could get you better speeds and lower cost. To the major ISPs, that municipal broadband is more competition that means fewer customers for them. To help stave the rollout of municipal broadband networks major ISPs have taken to lobbying.

Getting content delivered to your PC, TV or mobile device via the Internet is no simple matter, but the business ecosystem working behind that can be even more convoluted. While not exactly pointing to the fact, new data gathered about Internet performance might be pointing the finger at the almost unspoken but widely practiced business of peering.

The nation is all ears today as President Obama delivered his State of the Union address. As such, it will be highly unlikely anyone will miss the President's special mention of Apple, Microsoft, and a few other key players in the tech industry for their efforts in improving the country's education system by connecting students to high-speed broadband.

The internet as we know it is in peril. Verizon's victory in the court of appeal this week, seeing the FCC's attempts to regulate broadband providers in the name of Net Neutrality defeated, has the potential to change how we access the internet and web services like Netflix, Hulu, and others more fundamentally than 2013's SOPA threatened to. In question isn't whether internet access should be a free-for-all, but what it is fundamentally, legally classified as, and who therefore has control over what gets shuttled through: Verizon and the broadband providers, in control of the "pipes", or the FCC as protector of infrastructure that uses public rights of way. For all both sides are claiming some degree of victory this week, we're still no closer to settling that fundamental question.

Dish Network has announced that it will be collaborating with a major wireless carrier to trial a fixed wireless broadband service. Dish will be working with Sprint on the broadband service trial, which will be conducted in Corpus Christi, Texas. Dish expects that the fixed wireless broadband service will be available by mid-2014.